Shah Alam - i-City

Yet to buy a laptop, hence, irregular update.

My friend treated me to i-City, Shah Alam, few weeks back as my birthday treat (a one-month late birthday gift). I always thought that i-City is only for its night light view but apparently, there are other attractions beside the night light show. It was a Group On promotion that we took which include five attractions available in i-City.

Water World @ i-City

First of all, we went to the Water World @ i-City for some water rides. To be honest, I was quite disappointed with the rides available in the park. It was just too small to justify its name. I mean, I would have assume a water theme park named Water World @ i-City would take hours to fully finish their rides. But, sadly, all it took was just an hour plus and you are done with it.

These water slides are just so-so

Look at the Ultimate Tornado which is AMAZING...

And most of the water slides are not thrilling, to be honest. The only saving grace has to be the Ultimate Tornado spiral slide which is AWESOME. Make sure there are four of you for the ride require four persons. If not, ask some strangers to join you for it.

Ultimate Tornado takes four persons to go for it

Next in the voucher is the SnoWalk. While dress code insists its patrons to wear long pants and covered shoes, I went in with shorts and flip flop. I ended up shivering non stop. Generally, nothing much for you to do here other than riding on few slides they have here and taking pictures. I believe the Snow World in Genting Highland is a better option of the two. For SnoWalk, please bring your own gloves and boots if you want to save your budget for the rental fee is steep.

Ice sculptures in SnoWalk

Trick Art Museum is more like a photo taking outlet where public do candid poses along with the paintings. These paintings, if posed correctly, will give off a three dimensional impression. The selection is not that many and appeals only to those who are interested in doing funny shots. The remaining two attractions included in the Group On voucher are Ferris wheel and the double-deck carousel. Nothing much can be said about these two rides.

Entrance to the Trick Art Museum

Few of these paintings on display

I honestly think i-City has the potential to grow but the management team is not really giving all their bests to improve it. The best asset of this place has to be the night light display and understandably so. It is rather beautiful.

Ferris wheel

Carousel

With the Group On voucher, the visit is still border line worth it. However, if you ask me whether I would go without it, sorry, can’t do.

Beautiful night light, the best asset in i-City

Sharing is caring. A word of advice and a piece of information.

Each attraction has its own entrance fee. For Water World @ i-City, the price for adult is RM 40.00 on Mondays to Fridays and RM 50.00 on Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays while for children, it is RM 30.00 and RM 40.00 respectively. For SnoWalk, the entrance prices before 6 pm are RM 25.00 and RM 20.00 for adult and children, after 6 pm are RM 35.00 and RM 30.00 respectively. Trick Art Museum is free of charge if you purchased Water World @ i-City's ticket. If not, the charge is RM 5.00. 

Taiping - Taiping Zoo

Hello, readers, however few you may be.

Sorry for the lack of updates. My laptop has officially been certified, leaving me no other means of posting any entries. Using my phone to do so seems like such a tedious work, so, I rather wait until I bought a new laptop. Or like now, when I borrow my friend's laptop for a night. Anyhow, I'll just post new entries whenever I found a way to do so.

Back in last month, I followed my friends to Taiping for a day trip. The purpose was to go exploring the Hindu temples around the town. In between the temples hopping, we also stopped by some famous places in Taiping such as the Lake Garden, Maxwell Hill and Taiping Zoo.


RM 12.00 per adult



I had been to the zoo quite a number of times and I always find the animals in the zoo rather inactive. They would just laze around the cages, either sleeping off the afternoon or just laying there doing nothing. The same scenario happened for this visit and the animals were just motionless. Well, can't really blame them since the weather that day was freaking humid.

It was such a hot day that we can't blame them for not moving...

 Not all the animals were inactive. Some are still giving us quite a show. One particular giraffe was interacting with us visitors, giving off some very striking poses. The tigers were at one point roaring out loud, possibly arguing who's going to go into the manmade cave. They were even attempting to fight until the hot weather demotivated them, I presume.

Hello, handsome!



These two tigers were having a fight off!

And the losing one being exiled to far end...

Flamingos!



This camel is sponsored by AmBank...

Taiping Zoo is still a nice place to bring your families and children to get up close with nature. Its close distance to both Penang and Ipoh gives the zoo an added advantage for those living in these cities. Besides the Taiping Zoo, there is also a night safari that you can consider going. I have yet to go for it so, maybe, I should. Someday.

Kuala Lumpur - Marini's on 57

Last weekend, some of my school friends came up from Ipoh and we have a stay over in a rented unit in Sri Mutiara Apartment, about 3 km away from the city centre. The main activity for the night was to go to Marini's on 57.

Marini's on 57

Located on the 57th floor of the Petronas Tower 3 (hence, the name), Marini's on 57 is a high end establishment that boasts top notch view of KL skyline. Consists of a restaurant, a bar and a lounge, Marini's on 57 is definitely the 'It' place to be.

The twin tower as background

We made reservation for the bar as we just want to enjoy refreshments as well as soak in the awesome views. The atmosphere is relaxing and, as with most bars, the lighting is dim, with most of the light coming from the twin tower itself. Just imagine how close we are to the national landmark.

My friends are in awe with the skyline view

As for the drinks, we all ordered cocktails. Being cheapskates that we are, we went during Happy Hour (5pm - 9pm) to enjoy affordable alcoholic drinks. There are only five choices of cocktails listed for Happy Hour (Mojito, The 57 Sour, Marini's Sangaree, Bali Hali and Italiano) for you to choose from and all are priced RM 25.00. All of it are deliciously intoxicating.

Have to use Instagram photo as I failed to take a decent shot using DSLR

Comparison between Marini's on 57 with the KL SkyBar cannot be avoided. While I find the drinks in Marini's are better, the ones in SkyBar, especially during Happy Hour, are cheaper, albeit with much fewer choices. Atmosphere wise, the one in Marini's is simple and sophisticated while the pool in SkyBar offers an unique decor. As for the view of the twin tower, I still prefer the one from KL SkyBar.

We stayed there until around ten plus before heading back to the apartment for more fun and laughter. Seriously, good time + amazing friends = awesome memories!

Group shot!

With the twin tower as backdrop...

Me and the ladies...

More nights like this are seriously needed.

Kuala Lumpur - SkyBar, Traders Hotel

One of my resolutions for 2013 is to explore Kuala Lumpur more. Honestly, I have been living in the city for more than a year now and the only places that I have been to the most are the shopping centres in the capital city. Well, not anymore for this year, I'll be exploring KL and see what the city can offer.

SkyBar @ Traders Hotel, KL

The first stop of the year has to be the famous SkyBar. If you are looking for a great spot to enjoy a drink or two with the Petronas Twin Tower serving as your background, look no further for this lounge is the place to be. Located at the 33rd floor of Traders Hotel, SkyBar offers unparallel views of the two maizes.

After many failed attempts last year, finally, I had landed my feet on SkyBar itself together with two of my friends last Saturday. And boys, was I not disappointed.

SkyBar is best described as followed: a narrow stripe of space with one side providing unarguably the best views of the tallest building in the country (the other side offers nothing to be excited about), a shallow-looking pool dominating the central ground, the room beautifully lit by neon colours, the music not too loud, not too soft, just perfect to the ears. In short, just the right spot for chilling out and sipping a cocktail or two.

Window seats, with the pool in the centre

The bar

We made no reservation but still, we managed to secure a window seat rather quick. All you have to do is to  put your name in the waiting list and once there is empty table or a cancelled reservation, you will be called. We waited at most 30 minutes.

The Petronas Twin Tower

The left side

The right side

You can even see the water fountain show in KLCC Park

The drinks that we ordered:

Mai Tai (RM 19++)

Well, all of us had the Mai-Tai (the Happy Hour drink) because, however fancy the place may be or well-dressed we are, we are still very poor, financially speaking. Once we moved to the window seat, we ordered one of their snacks, Sticky Nachos.

Sticky nachos, which according to my friend, addictive...

We took photos, we chatted, we drank (very little, unfortunately), we ate. By the time it was 10.30 pm, we left as we had satisfied our hungers for all things beautiful.

How can there be no group shot???

Well, in my opinion, SkyBar is worth a visit as the drinks are reasonably priced and the atmosphere is amazing. The service is rather good and even though you do not have any reservation made, you still can have window seats. The only drawback is that not everyone adheres to the dress code (if there is one). I saw people wearing shorts and sandals. A shame, though.

All in all, I will definitely come again for nothing but relaxation.

One cocktail is not enough for me X-D

p/s I'm procrastinating, I know, I know. I will end my Vietnam post soon. This statement appears far too often, giving off nothing but hollow ring, but I will wrap it up if it's the last thing I'll do.

Sharing is caring. A word of advice and a piece of information.

SkyBar at Traders Hotel is easily accessible even by public transportation. Just take the Kelana Jaya line to KLCC and walk for 5 - 10 minutes to the Traders Hotel which is at the other end of the KLCC Convention Centre, the one furthest from the Suria KLCC. If not, a quick call to the taxi and all your worries will be gone. Their Happy Hour lasts until 9.00 pm everyday and the Happy Hour drinks differ from Mondays to Sundays. Refer to their official website here for more details.

My Son Sanctuary - An UNESCO Heritage Site

Since I was already here in central Vietnam, why not explore other places within close vicinity? I have every intention of going to My Son Sanctuary during my stay in Hoi An. Located about 40 to 50 km away from the quaint town, there are many ways for you to go from one UNESCO Heritage Site to another UNESCO Heritage Site and I chose one of the least common mode of transportation: cycling.

Mi Quang for breakfast to fuel my day

The idiotic and egoistic side of me thought that 40-50 km was a manageable distance, and I did reach the temple ruins, with times and my body being the only casualties. I cycled for almost 4 hours to reach my destination and my legs were sore, to say the least. Imagine my horror when I realized I have to do another 4 hours of cycling to go back to Hoi An. (I 'hitchhiked' back to Hoi An with a Malaysian couple in their rented van. Their driver was not very friendly to me.) I now understood why the owner of the hotel gave me a smile when I said I wanted to cycle from Hoi An to My Son.

Beautiful paddy field while cycling

This is NOT the sign you want to see for it means you're lost

Even though it was a strenuous work, I have no regret in doing so (at least when I finally reached the location. I had tempted to turn back to Hoi An throughout the journey). This cycling expedition was an eye-opening to the kind-hearted and friendly peoples of Vietnam.

It's not that unusual to have the whole road to yourself

The Vietnamese were very willing in helping me whenever I got lost or detoured on my way heading there. Even though there was language barrier, we managed to understand each other perfectly well, with a lot of hand gestures and body languages. Asking for direction with all sorts of hand movements can be fun and entertaining.

Thanks to the locals, I was getting nearer

As for the reason of this adventure of mine, the temples in My Son Sanctuary were built by the Cham people for religious and spiritual purposes. Hindu influences were significant in its architectural designs and most of the temples were dedicated to Hindu deities. However, after the end of the Champa kingdom, most of these structures were reclaimed by the jungle and left unattended. Wars during the tiring times were of no help with damages being done on these temples.

The designation of the UNESCO Heritage Site title to the ancient ruins of My Son introduced the world to these temples. While not as magnificent in term of magnitude and scales when compared to other ancient ruins in the region such as Angkor Wat in Cambodia, the Bagan Archaeological Zone in Myanmar, Borobudur in Indonesia, et cetera, it worth making a day trip to the site if you happened to be in Danang or Hoi An. Here's the pictures of My Son Sanctuary.

Some of the temples are in better shape

Some artifacts inside one of the ancient temples on display

Not all ruins are in good conditions...

Definitely worth a visit when you are in central Vietnam.

*TO BE CONTINUED*

Sharing is caring. A word of advice and a piece of information.

As My Son Sanctuary is about 40 to 50 km away from Hoi An, you can follow bus tour to the ruins. Most hotels offer bus trips to the site and if they do not have it, they can help arrange one for you. For the more adventurous one, you can consider renting a motorbike and ride to the sanctuary. For the extreme, do what I did and cycle your ways to My Son. As for the entrance fee to the site, it is VND 60,000 (about RM 9.60).